A new year, a fresh start and a 100% debt free-dom
update…..
As I have been sitting around stirring waiting for my baby
to be ready to be born, I have spent a lot of time mulling in my own thoughts.
Lots of time dreaming. As well as a lot of time pinning in Pinterest. Let’s just say I have been a little stir
crazy. I have been trying to keep off my
feet to prevent my … [Read more...]

As I was cleaning out a food storage room in the basement I
found some time capsules. Time capsules from the year this home was built. 1953…
60 years ago. In the depths of the darkest corner, deep beneath some shelves
there they were….
And what were these great time capsules? Four, two quart canning jars with dried fruit. “Fumigated Figs and Prunes” to be exact,
dated 6/53. … [Read more...]

Friends to the rescue!! I was having a terrible time uploading photos onto blogger and I posted on my blog my troubles and I had a friend let me know that she had the same problem and was using explorer. I started using Chrome and things are working again. I wish I would have known sooner. Lots of my blogger troubles were because I was using Explorer I guess!! Thanks Amy!!!
Living in … [Read more...]

My Grandparents were diligent about being prepared and food
storage. They even built plenty of
storage in their home so they could properly store food. There are two large storage rooms in the
basement dedicated to food storage and a third storage room for water and hygiene items.
Each room there are walls lined with bottles and bottles of canned fruit, … [Read more...]

I have been in a blogging slump. I have had dozens of awesome things happen over the past couple of months that I would love to documents here on this blog. I just have so many things; I don’t know where to begin.
So if I don’t ever get to posting about all this goodness here is my list….
If I were to blog and catch up on things, here are the titles of my catch up list starting with … [Read more...]

I planted a garden twice this year. Round one with seeds was a complete fail. I had some peas sprout, but they were quickly eaten away by bugs. I am guessing the culprit was earwigs, those nasty bugs are such a pest. It actually could have been ants or pill bugs too, they have given me garden problems in the past.
I had some other plants sprout: lettuce, carrots and broccoli but no more than a … [Read more...]

It is not too late to make strawberry jam. I saw strawberries on sale just last week! I made this batch earlier this summer. I made two different recipes.
The first batch was a simple, simple recipe:
Fresh from the garden!
Rhubarb Strawberry Jam: adapted from Allrecipies.com
5 cups chopped fresh rhubarb
3 cups white sugar
1 (3 ounce) package of strawberry flavored gelatin
2 cups … [Read more...]

Four plus months ago, I was happily awaiting the arrival of our new addition. (click here for those details) I had another month and a half before Lil’Bean was supposed to arrive and I had a lot of things that needed to get done. One of the things I had on my list was to pick up 80 lbs of chicken I had purchased bulk from Zaycon Foods. My plan was to can half of the chicken … [Read more...]

My wonderful adventure continues.
I ordered 40lbs of boneless, skinless chicken breast. I decided to can 30lbs and freeze 10lbs.
As I trimmed fat and cut the chicken breast into cubes I sanitized my jars in the dishwasher.
After preparing the chicken I packed it into the canning jars and used a knife to push what air I could out of the jar.
I then added a ½ tsp. of salt to each of the … [Read more...]